Survival Friends: Project Zomboid Multiplayer Enters Beta

What are you doing this weekend? I'll be doing what I always do: travelling to Wales to watch a roller derby match, and playing a multiplayer survival game in a world populated by zombies. No, for once the latter doesn't mean DayZ, but Project Zomboid. The long-in-alpha isometric RPG recently released a new beta-for-the-alpha, which adds multiplayer and is downloadable via Steam.

Zomboid has been providing systemic anecdotes about grim survival for years, from the time I accidentally smothered my wife with a pillow, to all the other times I died under the onslaught of a zombie swarm after failing to check a back garden for undeads. It's always been a lonely experience, though. That fits with the atmosphere, but it often makes it a grim game to play. Other players, even if they're competing for resources as much as working together, immediately makes any game a little more pleasant to keep returning to.

It's early days for that multiplayer in Zomboid, which is why it's not yet part of the main release of the game, but it seems to be plenty playable. As per Dean "Rocket" "creator of DayZ" Hall below.

If you want to try it out for yourself, you need to follow the instructions in the Project Zomboid forum post. It's a touch fiddly, but only slightly.